Lullaby
by Jameson Rook
Summary: "If you can hear me now, I'm reaching out to let you know you're not alone. And if you can't tell, I'm scared as hell 'cause I can't get you on the telephone. So, just close your eyes, oh honey, here comes a lullaby." WARNING: Character death


_**Disclaimer: Castle and all of its characters belong to Andrew W. Marlowe and ABC Productions. "Lullaby" belongs to Nickelback. **_

_** WARNING: this fic contains strong language and a character death. If you do not like either of these things, turn away from this fic now, I caution you. **_

_** A/N: this is going to be an A/U fic, Alexis does not exsist, and Rick and Kate are married. This idea popped into my head when I watched the Nickelback video for this song, and it is actually a Castle-ized version of the video. I hope you guys enjoy it as much as I enjoy writing it. **_

**Well, I know the feeling of finding yourself stuck out on the ledge,**

**And there ain't no healing from cutting yourself with the jagged edge.**

**I'm telling you that it's never that bad,**

**Take it from someone who's been where you're at,**

**Laid out on the floor, and you're not sure you can take this anymore.**

**So, just give it one more try to a lullaby,**

**And turn this up on the radio.**

**If you can hear me now, I'm reaching out to let you know you're not alone.**

**And if you can't tell, I'm scared as hell 'cause I can't get you on the telephone.**

**So, just close your eyes, oh honey, here comes a lullaby.**

**Your very own lullaby.**

"Come on, baby, I'm so proud of you. You're so beautiful, and I'm so lucky you're my wife." Rick spewed at a faster rate than he'd thought possible.

"Rick?" She gasped, her back arching off of the gurney slightly.

"Yeah, baby, I'm here, what do you need?"

"Shut the hell up!" Kate bellowed, clutching his hand and breathing in ragged pants. The nurses and medics wheeled her through the hallways quickly and her husband, Richard, was running beside them. She clutched his hand so hard that he swore he could feel his bones shifting. His fingers had turned purple on the ride over as she squeezed them during the blinding pain of her contractions.

But none of that mattered to him. He was going to be a dad. His entire life had been leading up to this moment, and he could not be happier about who he was sharing it with. Kate was his everything. His wife, his best friend, his partner in everything. But, most of all, he was her one and done. They were always.

The medics careened them into the delivery room quickly.

"Okay, Misses Castle, you're at 10 centimeters, and we're going to be able to start pushing soon. You guys certainly were cutting it close getting here weren't you?" The doctor chuckled, glancing at the frazzled couple. Rick gave him a sheepish smile and mumbled something about the traffic being heavy. In reality, the moment that Kate had told him her water had broken, he'd been so overwhelmed with excitement that he'd passed out. When he came around, they had sped towards the hospital as quickly as they could through rush hour traffic.

"Are you ready to start pushing, Misses Castle?" The nurse asked, her fake tone enough to have Rick gritting his teeth, but Kate shot the woman a glare that could have melted an ice cap. She nodded and let out a growl that sounded something like 'get it out' and clenched Rick's hand tighter as she started to push.

Her screams tore through the delivery room, drowning out the drone of the machines and doctors orders. Rick's ears were ringing by the time she had fallen back against her pillow, exhausted from pushing.

"Okay, Kate, that was good, now take a couple seconds before we go again." She sucked in a few deep breaths and her entire body tensed again as she pushed, tightening her grip on his hands and letting out another roar. "I can see his head, Kate! Keep pushing, give me a little more, sweetie!" The doctor called. Rick felt his heart begin to flutter, knowing that he was so close to his son.

Kate's muscles tightened once more as she pushed harder, her eyes screwed shut and her teeth bared as she growled through her pain. Suddenly, out of nowhere, her hand dropped from his, her head fell back to the pillow and her eyes lulled open to show the whites.

"Kate?" He screamed, his hands framing her face. "Honey? Say something, Katie! Please!" The dull note of a flat line filled the delivery room, alarming him even further.

"She's coding, get me a crash cart!" The doctor bellowed, sprinting to the side of the bed and tugging his shoulder, shoving him towards the door.

"What's happening to my wife?"

"Someone get him out of here!" The doctor ordered and suddenly he was being shuffled out into the waiting room, his wife's blood coating the front of his shirt where the doctor had pushed him.

He sucked in a few shaky breaths before the tears started, his sobs choking him and stealing his breath away. He stared at the doors, waiting for something, anything to happen.

He was sitting in the waiting room for what seemed like a lifetime before the doctor stepped through the swinging doors to the delivery room. He leveled an apologetic look into Rick's eyes and shook his head sadly.

And just like that, his entire world crumbled to the ground. The nurse followed soon after, leading him by the elbow to the nursery. He drew his hand over the back of his eyes and dried his tears as he walked among the rows of basinets until he reached one that had his last name on the tag.

He reached into the plastic crib and lifted his baby in his arms cautiously. The infant stared up at him with loving eyes. Kate's eyes. He immediately felt a film of bitterness coat the back of his throat. This is the reason that his wife was gone. This baby that he'd been so eager to have.

The _'adoption'_ pamphlet that the nurse extended to him after he settled the baby back into the crib was shaking in his grasp. It wasn't something that he'd ever considered, but he knew he could do this without her.

**Please, let me take you out of the darkness and into the light,**

**'Cause I have faith in you that you're gonna make it through another night.**

**Stop thinking about the easy way out, **

**There's no need to go and blow the candle out, **

**Because you're not done, you're far too young, and the best is yet to come.**

**So, just give it one more try to a lullaby, and turn this up on the radio.**

**If you can hear me now, I'm reaching out to let you know that you're not alone.**

**And, if you can't tell, I'm scared as hell 'cause I can't get you on the telephone.**

**So, just close your eyes, oh honey, here comes a lullaby.**

**Your very own lullaby.**

It was two-thirty in the morning and the baby was screaming. Again. Rick groaned and rolled out of his bed, stumbling down the hallway and trying to rub the sleep from his eyes. He leaned into the crib and lifted the baby, cradling him against his chest and moving towards the kitchen to make him a bottle.

"Yeah, I hear ya, little man. Food, I know. We're going to the kitchen right now, just cool your jets." He muttered, his patience already worn thin after being woken from a comfortable sleep.

The baby's screams were a vibrato, melancholy symphony that spoke volumes to the origin of the bags under his eyes that could hold luggage for a month's vacation. He rocked the baby gently in one arm and moved to grab the premade bottle out of the fridge to heat, but the plastic bottle clattered to the floor.

"Fuck!" He cursed, slamming his palm against the cupboard. That only served to make the baby scream louder. Rick cradled the baby to the crook of his neck and rocked him. He couldn't do this. It was too fucking hard. Everything hurt. Breathing. Eating. Sleeping. Holding his own son filled him with rage.

The adoption pamphlet stared up at him from where it lay on the counter top. He bent to grab the bottle and submurged it in the boiling water on the pot. The pamphlet taunted him. It screamed at him. But he pushed the thought to the back of his mind.

Kate wouldn't want him to abandon their son just because he thought it was _too hard_. He shifted the still screaming baby once again and heaved a distraught sigh as he pulled the warmed bottle out of the water and offered it to the child. He sucked it hungrily, his screams _finally_ silenced. Rick collapsed onto the couch with the baby and stared at the photos that adorned the mantle.

She smiled down at him, causing his own grin to form. She was the most beautiful woman that he'd ever met in his life. He remembered the first time they'd met when he was working on _In A Hail of Bullets_ at The Old Haunt. She'd come in with her mother, and he was striken by the bold, brunette beauty that bumped into him on the way to the bathroom.

He had steadied her by resting his hand on her elbow and was about to murmur an apology when she smiled at him and all coherent though had fled his brain. She had laughed at his stammering, and he had known that she was the one for him then and there.

The next photo he looked at was their fourth wedding anniversary. He had her pulled tightly to him and was placing a kiss on the top of her head. It was a candid photo that her best friend, Lanie Parish, had taken at their anniversary party. He remembered the moment like it was the day before, though. She had pulled him aside because she was having a breakdown. They'd been trying to have a child since they had gotten married, and to that point nothing had worked.

He had pulled her into his arms and told her that everything would be alright, and that someday they would have the family that they'd always dreamed of.

Next to that photo, there was a photo of them from their vacation to California. Kate was feigning a swoon and Rick was posing as a 'rockstar', his finger extended in the motion of a 'hey there' gun, and his sun glasses were pulled slightly down his nose to reveal his arctic blue eyes. The leather jacket and fact that he'd slick his unruly brown hair simply completed the Elvis Presely vibe of the photo, which to be honest, was what he'd been going for the whole time. He let out a soft chuckle at the fond memory before moving to the last photo.

The picture took his breath away as it had done every day of the three weeks since their son was born and she was taken from him. The picture was a sepia toned pose, and from the decor he recognized that it was their bedroom. He was leaning into Kate's _very_ pregnant stomach and placing a kiss to the bulging skin. His eyes had fluttered closed, and her fingers were laced in his hair, a broad grin on her face.

He glanced down at the baby, and found him sleeping once again, the bottle resting on his bottom lip. He smirked at the child and stood slowly, careful not to wake him, before moving to the nursery. He laid the tiny frame into the crib and moved to click off the light. He paused as he shut the door and leaned his head back into the room.

"I love you, little man." He whispered before closing the door and moving back to his bed for a fitful hour or two of sleep.

**Well, everybody's hit the bottom, everybody's been forgotten.**

**When everybody's tired of being alone, yeah, everybody's been abandoned,**

**And left a little empty handed, **

**So, if you're out there barely hangin' on...**

**Just give it one more try to a lullaby, and turn this up on the radio.**

**If you can hear me now, I'm reaching out to let you know that you're not alone.**

**And if you can't tell, I'm scared as hell 'cause I can't get you on the telephone.**

**So, just close your eyes, oh honey, here comes a lullaby.**

**Your very own lullaby.**

Two days had passed since his outburst in the kitchen, and his patience had worn thin once again. He rocked the baby slowly as he prepared the area to change him. He laid the baby down, but there was the screaming and the crying and the...everything. There was too much everything for him to handle.

He tugged the strands of his hair angrily and slammed his fists onto the hardwood floor.

"I don't know what you want from me!" He screamed, standing and pacing in front of the baby. "You scream if I feed you, you scream if I change you, you scream if I talk to you, I'm surprised you don't cry in your fucking sleep!" He fumed, and knelt back down to change him. He was in the middle of trying to subdue the baby's kicking feet when his phone started to slip out of his shirt pocket. He fumbled to catch it but he missed and it hit the floor.

Then he heard it. Her voice. Her laugh. He lifted the phone and watched her face as she ran her hands over her protruding stomach and smirking at him.

"I love you, Richard Castle. And I love our little boy. And if you don't turn off that camera, I'm going to kick your ass. You don't want to be the man who's pregnant wife kicked his ass, do you?" She let loose another giggle.

"Well, come on now honey, I just want to catalogue this so we can show Decimus this on his graduation day."

"Rick, we are not naming him Decimus. Nice try though." She smiled. It was only then that Rick noticed that the baby had stopped screaming and was staring at the back of his phone in amazement.

Rick turned the phone so that he could see the screen and the baby's eyes lit up. He grinned slightly and set the phone next to his head while he changed his diaper. He lifted the baby carefully and cradled him in his arms. He leaned his back against the wall and propped his knees up so he could rest the baby on them and look at him. He smiled at the tiny face peering back at him as he reached into the chest pocket of his shirt.

He pulled the adoption pamphlet from his shirt and crumpled it into a ball before tossing it into the trash can across the room. He pulled his son close to him and placed a soft kiss to his head. Everything was going to be okay, and they were going to be fine. He thought a moment, deciding that he needed to take the next big step that he'd been putting off since Kate died.

"James." He said softly, stroking the baby's hair gently. "James Beckett Castle. Your mother wanted you to be named after your grandpa, and her last name was Beckett before we got married, so that's going to be your middle name." He sucked in a deep breath as he noticed James' breath had evened out and he'd fallen asleep. "I love you, James Beckett Castle. You are my life, and I will _never_ let anything bad happen to you."

**Oh honey, here comes a lullaby.**

**Your very own lullaby.**

_** Thoughts? Reactions? Suggestions? Drop me a review and let me know.**_

_** Much love, J. Rook**_


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